Saturday, February 27, 2021

The Modern Worshippers of Molech

 

“The Lord spoke to Moses, saying, “Say to the people of Israel, Any one of the people of Israel or of the strangers who sojourn in Israel who gives any of his children to Molech shall surely be put to death. The people of the land shall stone him with stones. I myself will set my face against that man and will cut him off from among his people, because he has given one of his children to Molech, to make my sanctuary unclean and to profane my holy name. And if the people of the land do at all close their eyes to that man when he gives one of his children to Molech, and do not put him to death, then I will set my face against that man and against his clan and will cut them off from among their people, him and all who follow him in whoring after Molech” (Leviticus 20:1-5).

“Parents abusing their children, by sacrificing them to Moloch, v. 2, 3. There is the grossest absurdity that can be in all the rites of idolatry, and they are all a great reproach to men's reason; but none trampled upon all the honours of human nature as this did, the burning of children in the fire to the honour of a dunghill-god. It was a plain evidence that their gods were devils, who desired and delighted in the misery and ruin of mankind, and that the worshippers were worse than the beasts that perish, perfectly stripped, not only of reason, but of natural affection…Yet such was the power of the god of this world over the children of disobedience that this monstrous piece of inhumanity was generally practised; and even the Israelites were in danger of being drawn into it, which made it necessary that this severe law should be made against it. It was not enough to tell them they might spare their children (the fruit of their body should never be accepted for the sin of their soul), but they must be told, That the criminal himself should be put to death as a murderer: The people of the land shall stone him with stones (v. 2), which was looked upon as the worst of capital punishments among the Jews. If the children were sacrificed to the malice of the devil, the parents must be sacrificed to the justice of God. And, if either the fact could not be proved or the magistrates did not do their duty, God would take the work into his own hands: I will cut him off, v. 3. Note, Those that escape punishment from men, yet shall not escape the righteous judgments of God; so wretchedly do those deceive themselves that promise themselves impunity in sin. How can those escape against whom God sets his face, that is, whom he frowns upon, meets as an enemy, and fights against? The heinousness of the crime is here set forth to justify the doom” Matthew Henry, Commentary on Leviticus

The worship of Molech and associated deities was, as Matthew Henry so eloquently put it, the worst kind of idolatry. To sacrifice the fruit of one’s own body to the flames in order to appease a god has no comparison in the long annals of man’s inhumanity. As Paul points out in Romans 1, these individuals did not even have natural affection. Men are by nature lovers of their progeny. Nevertheless, there were many in ancient times whose practices were so abhorrent that they were repugnant even to those of their time who were not enlightened by the word of God.

It would be wonderful if we could say that all this child sacrifice was in the past. I’m sure, however, that you know where I’m going with this. Today, the worship of Molech is alive and well in the abortion industry. Children by the millions are aborted every year, in this country and around the world, the overwhelming majority of them because of the convenience of the parents. And perhaps the most dumbfounding aspect of this new sacrifice, is that those who most loudly proclaim that we should “follow the science” are the very ones who are the strongest proponents of this barbarity. And they do so in spite of the clear science that points to the fetus as human, not because of it. Thus, they give the lie to their proclamations about being interested in what the science has to say. They are all for the “science” when it is convenient; they jettison any pretense to following it when it is not.

Even so, although those who were guilty of this act were to be put to death in the Old Testament times, now under Christ there is forgiveness for both the purveyors of and the ones who seek this abomination. Those who repent and cry out to God for mercy will find in Him a perfect Savior who will not turn them away. “Those who come to me I will in no way cast out” is the promise of the Savior who came to die and to redeem the race, even from the abhorrent practice of abortion. If you are guilty of this sin, you do not have to die in it. You can find the forgiveness that Christ offers, if only you will repent and believe the gospel!



2 comments:

  1. Based on Romans 1 I have oft said that homosexuality is the bottom wrung of human degradation. But I may have been mistaken. Sacrificing ones offspring to Moloch (as I normally see it spelled) or in the spirit of Moloch vis a vis abortion may well be darker, deeper and uglier.

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    1. I was talking with my wife recently and expressing my wonder at how God has created woman with the capacity to bear children. How He made the female body in a way that it changes drastically to accommodate the new life within it. For someone whom God has created to bond with a child the way that woman should (and most do), to then turn around and murder that child is unspeakable evil. And those who aid her in doing so are just as guilty. All of them are murderers. The only true victim is the child. I would not want to stand before a vengeful God on the day of judgment and have to explain why I did such a heinous thing!!

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